President Donald Trump has renewed his attacks aimed at four Democratic congresswomen of color, alleging Sunday they are not “capable of loving our Country.” This follows days of similar statements by the president. Critics have deemed his recent comments about Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayana Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan as ‘racist.’
US to Press Pakistan PM on Afghan Peace, Terrorism Crackdown
U.S. President Donald Trump is likely to press Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan for help on ending the war in Afghanistan and fighting militants when the two leaders meet at the White House on Monday amid their countries’ strained relations.
Last year, Trump cut off hundreds of millions of dollars in security assistance to Pakistan, accusing Islamabad of offering “nothing but lies and deceit” while giving safe haven to terrorists, a charge angrily rejected by Islamabad.
Khan, who arrived in Washington on Saturday, is expected to try to mend fences and attract much-needed U.S. investment, hoping the arrest last week of a militant leader with a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head will lead to a warmer reception.
“The purpose of the visit is to press for concrete cooperation from Pakistan to advance the Afghanistan peace process and to encourage Pakistan to deepen and sustain its recent effort to crackdown on militants and terrorists within its territory,” a senior U.S. administration official said.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the United States wants to make clear to Pakistan that it is open to repairing relations if Pakistan changes how it handles “terrorists and militants.”
In Afghanistan, the official said, the peace process is at a critical point and Washington wants Pakistan “to pressure the Taliban into a permanent cease-fire and participation in inter-Afghan negotiations that would include the Afghan government.”
Trump wants to end U.S. military involvement in Afghanistan and Pakistan’s cooperation will be essential to any deal to end the war and ensure the country does not become a base for militant groups like Islamic State.
Khan’s visit follows the arrest on Wednesday of Hafiz Saeed, the alleged mastermind of a four-day militant attack on the Indian city of Mumbai in 2008, news that Trump welcomed on Twitter.
However, Pakistan has yet to release Shakil Afridi, the jailed doctor believed to have helped the CIA hunt down Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
The imprisonment of Dr. Shakil Afridi has long been a source of tension between Pakistan and the United States. Washington continues to call for his immediate release, the U.S. official told reporters on Friday.
Recycled Water Part of Perth’s Plan to Beat Climate Change in Australia
As drought-hit towns across New South Wales and Queensland edge closer to completely running out of water, federal and state governments in Australia are trying to come up with ways to guarantee supplies into the future. But on the other side of the continent, the city of Perth is leagues ahead in its water efficiency following a long-term decline in rainfall. Part of its survival plan relies on recycled water from toilets, a move that many consumers elsewhere still consider to be unpalatable.
Since 2017, residents in the Western Australian city of Perth have been drinking water recycled from sewage. It is filtered using a process called reverse osmosis, which is similar to forcing water through a giant sponge. It is then disinfected with ultra-violet light at a treatment plant, pumped into natural aquifers, and extracted.
Perth is a city of two million people, and Clare Lugar from Western Australia’s Water Corporation said it has had to get used to climatic changes.
“We know from the mid-70s onwards Perth’s rainfall has been declining by about 20 percent, and that has had a huge impact on our water sources that are dependent on the climate.”
Lugar said convincing residents of the benefits of drinking recycled sewage did take time.
“So, it is only a small percentage of the water that comes into the plant is actually from our toilets. But getting over that perception, that kind of image you might be drinking the water that you flushing down the toilet – that was probably one of our big challenges initially,” said Lugar.
Two desalination plants supply about half of Perth’s water. Aquifers are also crucial, but recycling produces only two percent of the total. But that figure is soon expected to rise.
Ian Wright, an expert in environmental science at Western Sydney University, believes other parts of Australia should embrace recycling.
“In Sydney that is probably 150 liters per day per person of waste water that is completely wasted, and, yes, we have the availability of desalination on the coast, but Canberra does not have desalination and then the poor drought-stricken towns like Tamworth and Dubbo, and Broken Hill, they could really, really use that now,” he said.
Australia is the world’s driest inhabited continent. Water is precious, and, in many places, scarce. More than 95 percent of New South Wales, Australia’s most populous state, is officially in drought, and the next three months are forecast to be drier than average.
‘Stronger Than Ever’: India Set for Fresh Moon Launch Attempt
India will make a second attempt Monday to send a landmark spacecraft to the Moon after an apparent fuel leak forced last week’s launch to be aborted.
The South Asian nation is bidding to become just the fourth nation — after Russia, the United States and China — to land a spacecraft on the Moon.
The mission comes 50 years after Neil Armstrong became the first person to step foot on the moon, an occasion celebrated by space enthusiasts globally on Saturday.
The fresh launch attempt for Chandrayaan-2 — Moon Chariot 2 in some Indian languages including Sanskrit and Hindi — has been scheduled for 2:43 pm (0913 GMT) on Monday, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said.
“Chandrayaan 2 is ready to take a billion dreams to the Moon – now stronger than ever before!” it said on Thursday.
The first launch attempt was scrubbed just under an hour before the scheduled lift-off because of what authorities described as a “technical snag.” Local media, citing ISRO officials, said that issue was a fuel leak.
The agency tweeted Saturday that a rehearsal for the launch was completed successfully.
Chandrayaan-2 will be launched atop a Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) MkIII, India’s most powerful rocket.
Experts said setbacks were to be expected in such missions given their complexity, and that it was more prudent to delay the launch instead of taking risks that may jeopardise the project.
“In such an ambitious and prestigious mission like Chandrayaan, one cannot take a chance even if a small flaw is detected,” Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan, head of space policy at the New Delhi think tank the Observer Research Foundation, told AFP.
Former NASA scientist Kumar Krishen said India’s space agency should be praised for taking on ambitious projects like Chandrayaan-2.
“We should keep in mind that space exploration is risky as many systems have failed in the past and many lives lost,” he told AFP.
National pride
Aside from propelling India into rarefied company among spacefaring nations, Chandrayaan-2 also stands out because of its low cost.
About $140 million has been spent on preparations for the mission, a much smaller price tag compared with similar missions by other countries — whose costs often run into billions of dollars.
Chandrayaan-2, and India’s space program as a whole, are a source of national pride in India.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has outlined an ambitious plan to launch a crewed space mission by 2022, and India hopes to seek out commercial satellite and orbiting deals.
The new mission comes almost 11 years after the launch of India’s first lunar mission — Chandrayaan-1 — which orbited the Moon and searched for water.
The rocket carrying Chandrayaan-2 will launch from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota, an island off the coast of the southern state of Andhra Pradesh.
The spacecraft will carry an orbiter, lander and a rover, which has been almost entirely designed and made in India.
The orbiter is planned to circle the Moon for about one year, imaging the surface and studying the atmosphere.
The lander, named Vikram, will head to the surface near the lunar South Pole carrying the rover. Once it touches down, the rover will carry out experiments while being controlled remotely by ISRO scientists.
It is expected to work for one lunar day, the equivalent of 14 Earth days, and will look for signs of water and “a fossil record of the early solar system”.
Trump: Four Democratic Congresswomen Not ‘Capable of Loving Our Country’
U.S. President Donald Trump contended Sunday that four minority Democratic congresswomen he has been feuding with are not “capable of loving our Country.”
“They should apologize to America (and Israel) for the horrible (hateful) things they have said,” Trump said on Twitter. “They are destroying the Democrat Party, but are weak & insecure people who can never destroy our great Nation!”
I don’t believe the four Congresswomen are capable of loving our Country. They should apologize to America (and Israel) for the horrible (hateful) things they have said. They are destroying the Democrat Party, but are weak & insecure people who can never destroy our great Nation!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
Trump immigration adviser Stephen Miller, told Fox News that Trump’s critical remarks of U.S. policies during his 2016 campaign were made out of love for America.
But he said “there’s a huge difference” between Trump’s credo of promoting “America first” and the lawmakers’ ideology “that runs down America.”
Congressman Elijah Cummings, one of several House committee chairmen investigating Trump and his administration’s policies, told ABC he believes Trump is a racist.
“Yes, no doubt about it,” Cummings contended. “I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt.”
Cummings says the four congresswomen targeted by Trump “love their country” and want to move closer to the “more perfect union that our founding fathers talked about. When you disagree with the president, suddenly you’re a bad person.”
He concluded, “Our allegiance is not to the president. Our allegiance is to the Constitution of the United States of America and the American people.”
Britain Drafts Plans to Sanction Iran in Tanker-Quarrel
British officials are drawing up plans to target Iran with sanctions for its seizing of a British-flagged oil tanker in the Strait off Hormuz, and it may urge European Union countries to reimpose sanctions that were lifted in 2016 as part of Tehran’s agreement to curb its nuclear program.
The British government is under strong pressure from lawmakers to act decisively in the sharply escalating diplomatic quarrel between the two countries, but there’s growing domestic criticism in the House of Commons about the lack of naval protection for British tankers in the Strait.
HMS Montrose was an hour away from the tanker as it was being swarmed by agile, high-speed Iranian small boats and a helicopter.
Later the British officer can be heard demanding from the Iranians in a dueling conversation to “please confirm that you are not intending to violate international law by unlawfully attempting to board the MV Stena.”
The British-registered ship’s crew is made up of Indian, Latvian, Filipino and Russian members.
As reports emerged in London of likely British retaliation, the Iranian ambassador to Britain, Hamid Baeidinejad, took to Twitter to warn the British not to escalate the quarrel.
UK government should contain those domestic political forces who want to escalate existing tension between Iran and the UK well beyond the issue of ships. This is quite dangerous and unwise at a sensitive time in the region. Iran however is firm and ready for different scenarios.
— Hamid Baeidinejad (@baeidinejad)
Iranian officials appeared to be trying Sunday to exploit divisions between the EU and Britain over the Gibraltar incident. Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, again reiterated Tehran’s contention that the U.S. had pushed Britain into a confrontation with Iran, blaming mainly U.S. national security adviser John Bolton.
Make no mistake:
Having failed to lure
Lufthansa Resumes Flights to Cairo after Safety Pause
Lufthansa has resumed flying to Cairo following a one-day suspension due to safety concerns.
The German airline’s website shows LH582 took off from Frankfurt after an almost two-hour delay and was expected to arrive in Egypt’s capital later Sunday.
On Saturday, British Airways announced the suspension of its flights to and from Cairo for seven days for unspecified reasons related to security.
British Airways attributed its cancellations to what it called its constant review of security arrangements at all airports, calling them “a precaution to allow for further assessment.”
Lufthansa said it was suspending its flights as a precaution, mentioning “safety” but not “security” as its concern.
Company spokespeople would not elaborate on what motivated the suspensions.
Doctors: Detainee Allegedly Tortured in Sudan Dies
A Sudanese civilian detained and allegedly tortured by security agents in a central town has died in custody, a doctors committee linked to the country’s protest movement said Sunday.
The man died on Saturday in the town of Dilling in the state of South Kordofan after he was detained by agents of the feared National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS), the doctors committee said in a statement.
The detainee “passed away on July 20, 2019 from torture while in detention at the NISS office in Dilling,” the statement said without elaborating on the circumstances of his arrest.
“NISS continues to torture and claim innocent civilian lives illegally without facing any consequences.”
Officers of NISS were not immediately available for comment.
Rights groups and activists had regularly accused NISS agents of cracking down on dissidents and restricting freedoms during the regime of veteran leader Omar al-Bashir who was ousted in April.
It was NISS that led a sweeping crackdown on protests against Bashir’s rule that first erupted in December.
Dozens were killed and hundreds of protesters, activists and opposition leaders were arrested during the months-long campaign that led to Bashir’s overthrow and subsequent demonstrations calling for civilian rule.
Last week a power-sharing deal was inked between the protest leaders and the ruling generals who seized power after ousting Bashir.
More talks between the two sides to thrash out some pending issues have been suspended following differences within the protest movement itself over the power-sharing deal.
Frozen and Waiting for Medical Science to Find A Cure
There are more than 150 patients at the “Alcor Life Extension Foundation.” Each had their body frozen cryonically shortly after death in the hopes that one day, medical science will find a cure for what killed them, and they can be revived and healed. It’s a scientifically dubious idea, but some people are willing to pay a lot of money in the hopes that one day they can come back for a long and healthy life. Iacopo Luzi has the story.
Teenagers Doing Free Home Repairs for People in Need
More than 400 teenagers from all over the US spent one week of their summer vacation renovating homes by day, and sleeping on the floor of local churches by night. As Faiza Elmasry tells us, the faith-based program is giving these young people a unique opportunity to learn and grow, while helping people in need. Faith Lapidus narrates.
Discarded Wood Recycled into New Instruments for Traditional Cuban Music
A family of Cuban luthiers has produced more than 500 musical instruments for Cuban schools over the past five years in an unprecedented agreement with the country’s ministry of culture, helping to fill a void in the state’s own ability to produce musical instruments.
Britain Calls Ship Seizure ‘Hostile Act’ As Iran Releases Video of Capture
Britain on Saturday denounced Iran’s seizure of a British-flagged oil tanker in the Gulf as a “hostile act” and rejected Tehran’s explanation that it seized the vessel because it had been involved in an accident.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards posted a video online showing speedboats pulling alongside the Stena Impero tanker, its name clearly visible. Troops wearing ski masks and carrying machine guns rappelled to its deck from a helicopter, the same tactics used by British Royal Marines to seize an Iranian tanker off the coast of Gibraltar two weeks ago.
Friday’s action in the global oil trade’s most important waterway has been viewed in the West as a major escalation after three months of confrontation that has already taken Iran and the United States to the brink of war.
It follows threats from Tehran to retaliate for Britain’s July 4 seizure of the Iranian tanker Grace 1, accused of violating sanctions on Syria.
British Defense Secretary Penny Mordaunt called the incident a “hostile act”. Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said he had expressed “extreme disappointment” by phone to his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Javad Zarif. Britain also summoned the Iranian charge d’affaires in London.
A spokesman for Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, Brigadier-General Ramezan Sharif, said Tehran had seized the ship in the Strait of Hormuz despite the “resistance and interference” of a British warship which had been escorting it. No British warship was visible in the video posted by the Guards.
Iran’s Fars news agency said the Guards had taken control of the Stena Impero on Friday after it collided with an Iranian fishing boat whose distress call it ignored.
The vessel, carrying no cargo, was taken to the Iranian port of Bandar Abbas. It will remain there with its 23 crew – 18 of them Indians – while the accident is investigated, Iranian news agencies quoted the head of Ports and Maritime Organization in southern Hormozgan province, Allahmorad Afifipour, as saying.
In a letter to the U.N. Security Council, Britain said the tanker was approached by Iranian forces when it was in Omani territorial waters exercising its lawful right of passage, and the action “constitutes illegal interference.”
“Current tensions are extremely concerning, and our priority is to de-escalate. We do not seek confrontation with Iran,” the letter said. “But it is unacceptable and highly escalatory to threaten shipping going about its legitimate business through internationally recognized transit corridors.”
Oil prices up
Zarif told Hunt that the ship must go through a legal process before it can be released, Iran’s ISNA news agency reported.
The strait, between Iran and the Arabian peninsula, is the sole outlet for exports of most Middle Eastern oil, and the seizure sent oil prices sharply higher. The United States, which tightened sanctions against Iran in May with the aim of halting its oil exports altogether, has been warning for months of an Iranian threat to shipping in the strait.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said he also discussed the situation with Hunt, his British counterpart.
“We talked about what they’ve seen, what they know, and how they’re beginning to think about how they will respond,” Pompeo said in an interview with the Washington Examiner that was published on Saturday by the State Department. “Iran is in a place today that they have taken themselves.”
Another oil tanker, the Mesdar, was also boarded by Iranian personnel on Friday and temporarily forced to divert toward Iran, but later was allowed to continue on its route through the strait. On Saturday Algeria’s APS news agency said the Mesdar was owned by Algeria’s state oil company Sonatrach.
France, Germany and the European Union joined Britain in condemning the seizure.
The three big European countries are signatories to a 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers that Washington undermined by quitting last year, setting Iran’s already fragile relations with the West on a downward spiral.
Under the pact, Iran agreed to restrict nuclear work in return for lifting sanctions. The European countries opposed the Trump administration’s decision to abandon the agreement last year, but have so far failed to fulfill promises to Iran of providing alternative means for it to access world trade.
Extreme disappointment
“Just spoke to … Zarif and expressed extreme disappointment that having assured me last Saturday Iran wanted to de-escalate situation, they have behaved in the opposite way,” Hunt wrote on Twitter. “This has to be about actions not words if we are to find a way through.”
Earlier he said London’s reaction would be “considered but robust” and it would ensure the safety of its shipping.
On Friday, Hunt said the solution would be found via diplomacy and London was “not looking at military options.” Britain’s government said it had advised British shipping to stay out of the Hormuz area for an interim period.
During the past three months of escalation, the United States and Iran come as close as ever to direct armed conflict. In June, Tehran shot down a U.S. drone and President Donald Trump ordered retaliatory air strikes, only to call them off just minutes before were to have been carried out.
The vessel had been heading to a port in Saudi Arabia and suddenly changed course after passing through the strait.
The United States has blamed Iran for a series of attacks on shipping around the Strait of Hormuz. Tehran has rejected the allegations. Washington also said it had this week downed an Iranian drone near where the Stena Impero was seized.
The United States is sending military personnel and resources to Saudi Arabia for the first time since the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Trump Relished Rally Chant, Ocasio-Cortez tells Constituents in Queens
U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said on Saturday that President Donald Trump relished a chant by the crowd at a campaign rally this week that called for a Democratic congresswoman to be sent back where she came from.
Trump renewed his criticism of four minority women lawmakers on Friday, saying that they had said horrible things about the United States, and defended himself from criticism over his comment that they should leave the United States if unhappy.
A day after saying his audience in North Carolina went too far when they chanted “Send her back!” about Somalia-born Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, on Friday he defended the crowd members as “incredible patriots.”
Appearing before her constituents in New York City for the first time since the latest flare-up between Trump and the four Democratic congresswomen, Ocasio-Cortez rejected the president’s statement that he had tried to quiet the crowd, saying he had egged them on instead.
“Roll back the tape … He relished it. He took it in and he’s doing this intentionally,” the freshman U.S. lawmaker told about 200 constituents gathered for a town hall meeting on immigration at a school in the Corona section of Queens.
Video of the crowd in North Carolina shouting “Send her back!” shows Trump pausing his speech and looking around the arena for about ten seconds.
The president’s attacks on the four congresswomen – known on Capitol Hill as “the squad” – have been condemned by Democrats as racist, while many Republicans have shrugged them off.
Last weekend Trump ignited a firestorm by tweeting the four should “go back” to where they came from if they do not like the United States.
All four are American citizens. Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan were born in the United States while Omar came as a refugee from Somalia and is a naturalized citizen.
All four are known as sharp critics of Trump’s policies as well as the Democratic leadership in the U.S. House of Representatives.
Ocasio-Cortez said the president’s comments had been hurtful, but “men like him” have been telling women like her to go back to their own country for a long time.
“We’re gonna stay right here,” she said to applause “That’s where we’re gonna go,” she said. “We’re not going anywhere.”
US Adviser Bolton Travels to Japan, S. Korea Amid Trade Dispute
White House national security adviser John Bolton departed on Saturday for a trip to Japan and South Korea as the two countries are in the middle of a trade dispute.
A White House National Security Council spokesman said on Twitter that Bolton planned to “continue conversations with critical allies and friends.”
President Donald Trump on Friday offered his help to ease tensions in the political and economic dispute between the United States’ two biggest allies in Asia, which threatens global supplies of memory chips and smartphones.
Lingering tensions, particularly over the issue of compensation for South Koreans forced to work for Japanese occupiers during World War Two, worsened this month when Japan restricted exports of high-tech materials to South Korea.
Japan has denied that the dispute over compensation is behind the export curbs, even though one of its ministers cited broken trust with Seoul over the labor dispute in announcing the restrictions.
The export curbs could hurt global technology companies.
Trump told reporters at the White House on Friday that South Korean President Moon Jae-in had asked him if he could get involved.
A spokeswoman for Moon confirmed Moon had asked Trump for help at their summit in Seoul on June 30.
During his trip, Bolton is also likely to seek support for a U.S. initiative to heighten surveillance of vital Middle East shipping lanes, which has been greeted warily by allies reluctant to raise tensions with Iran, which Washington blames for attacks on tankers.
Japanese media has said the issue could be on the agenda when Bolton visits Japan, where any military commitment abroad would risk inflaming a divide in public opinion in a country whose armed forces have not fought overseas since World War Two.
A South Korean official said last week Washington had yet to make any official request to Seoul on the issue.
The chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine General Joseph Dunford, said this month Washington hoped to enlist allies in a military coalition to safeguard strategic waters off Iran and Yemen, where Washington blames Iran and Iran-aligned fighters for attacks.
But with allies reluctant to commit new weaponry or fighting forces, a senior Pentagon official told Reuters on Thursday the aim was not to set up a military coalition but to shine a “flashlight” in the region to deter attacks on commercial shipping.
Kathryn Wheelbarger, who briefed NATO allies in the past week on the U.S. proposal, said it was less operational and more geared toward increasing surveillance capabilities.
Japan is the world’s fourth-biggest oil buyer and 86% of its oil supplies last year passed through the Strait of Hormuz, a vital shipping route linking Middle East oil producers to markets in Asia, Europe, North America and beyond.
Japan’s position is complicated by the fact that it has maintained friendly ties with Iran which it would be reluctant to damage. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe made an unsuccessful bid to ease tensions in the region when he met Iranian leaders in Tehran last month.
Trump Says Swedish PM Assured Him of Fair Treatment for US Rapper
WASHINGTON — U.S. President Donald Trump tweeted Saturday that Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven had assured him American citizen and rapper A$AP Rocky would be treated fairly.
Trump said he assured Lofven that Rocky was not a flight risk and personally vouched for his bail.
Swedish prosecutors on Friday extended Rocky’s detention by six days amid their investigation into a street fight in Stockholm.
Biden Likens Trump to Segregationist George Wallace
LOS ANGELES — Joe Biden, a former U.S. vice president and Democratic presidential candidate, has compared Republican President Donald Trump to the late George Wallace, a prominent supporter of racial segregation.
Biden, in California for a two-day swing to campaign and raise funds, told a gathering on Friday that Trump is “more George Wallace than George Washington.”
Wallace, remembered for his white supremacist views, served as Alabama’s governor for 20 years, beginning in 1967, and unsuccessfully sought the Democratic presidential nomination several times.
His 1972 presidential bid ended when he was shot, but he survived. Wallace died in 1998.
Biden’s comment came days after Trump said in a tweet that four U.S. congresswomen of color “should go back and help fix the totally broken and crime-infested places from which they came.”
The tweet kicked off a weeklong furor in Washington, with Democrats, and some Republicans, denouncing the comment as racist. Three of the four congresswomen were born in the United States, and all are U.S. citizens.
“Our children are listening to this. What the president says matters. It matters, because the president is the face of the nation,” Biden said in California.
Trump’s re-election campaign responded with a series of tweets highlighting what they said were Biden’s own past links to Wallace.
Inspired by Charlottesville rally
Biden, 76, says he was inspired to launch his 2020 White House bid after a 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a woman protesting was
murdered. After the rally, Trump said that there were “good people on both sides.”
Biden, who served under former Democratic President Barack Obama, the first black U.S. president, has found his own record on race in the spotlight since launching his White House bid.
Presidential rival Kamala Harris, a U.S. senator from California and a woman of color, challenged Biden on the issue during the first Democratic debate, leading to its most contentious exchange.
Biden has also tried to tamp down criticism after recent comments that he, as a U.S. senator from Delaware in the 1970s, worked with two Southern segregationist senators to get things done.
Biden has stressed that he entered politics in the early 1970s to fight for civil rights for minorities and civil liberties.
Biden and Harris are two of 25 Democratic candidates vying to become the party’s nominee to take on Trump in the November 2020 election. The two Democrats will face off in a second televised debate on July 31.
Pompeo Tells Turkey of Disappointment About Missile Purchase
WASHINGTON — U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke with Turkey’s foreign minister on Saturday and expressed disappointment over the country’s acquisition of the Russian S-400 missile system, the U.S. State Department said in a statement.
Washington had opposed Turkey’s purchase of the Russian missile defense system and threatened to impose sanctions. Since then, President Donald Trump has been unclear about whether his administration was planning such an action.
Several Republican and Democratic U.S. lawmakers on Thursday pressed Trump to impose sanctions on Turkey for the purchase.
Thousands Gather for Pro-Police Rally in Hong Kong
HONG KONG — Tens of thousands gathered in Hong Kong on Saturday to voice support for the police and call for an end to violence, after a wave of protests against an extradition bill triggered clashes between police and activists and plunged the city into crisis.
The rally, called “Safeguard Hong Kong,” came a day ahead of another mass protest planned against the government and its handling of the now-suspended extradition bill that would have allowed people in Hong Kong to be sent to mainland China for trial.
Police have called for calm ahead of Sunday’s protest, where security is expected to be tight. Authorities have removed metal barriers — which activists have used to block roads during previous demonstrations — from areas around the march route.
“We are experiencing the most serious revolution after Hong Kong’s handover,” said former Legislative Council President Jasper Tsang. “We are also experiencing the most serious challenge for “One Country, Two Systems,” he added, referring to the system under which Hong Kong is governed since its handover from British to Chinese rule in 1997.
Explosive found in raid
Also Saturday, the Associated Press reported that police in Hong Kong found about 2 kilograms of a powerful homemade explosive, TATP, and arrested a man in a raid on a commercial building late Friday night. TATP, or tri-acetone tri-peroxide, has been used in terrorist attacks worldwide.
Local media reported that police found materials voicing opposition to the extradition bill at the site, the AP reported. A police spokesman said no concrete link between the explosives cache and the march had been established, and they were continuing to investigate.
Hong Kong’s embattled leader, Carrie Lam, has apologized for the turmoil the extradition bill has caused and declared it “dead,” although opponents say nothing short of its full withdrawal will do.
Demonstrators, mostly middle-aged or older and dressed in white, braved heavy rain and thunderstorms to gather at the city’s Tamar Park, next to the Legislative Council, which protesters stormed and raided on July 1, the 22nd anniversary of Hong Kong’s handover to Chinese rule.
Some waved Chinese flags as others chanted “Hong Kong Cheer Up” and “Support Hong Kong Police.”
‘We’re all in the same boat’
A fleet of around 12 fishing boats circled Victoria Harbor next to the rally with banners draped over the side of the vessels that read “Put away the combat, fight for Hong Kong” and “Cherish Hong Kong, we’re all in the same boat.”
“Violence is intolerant. We are distressed about our home and we should absolutely stand out to support Hong Kong police, to maintain stability and rule of law in society,” said Tsol Pui, 85, president of Hong Kong Veterans’ Home.
Echoing that sentiment, Tang King Shing, Hong Kong’s former police commissioner, said: “Police, we support you. You should not have suffered from the disaster made by those thugs. … We Hong Kong people come out to safeguard Hong Kong.”
Organizers said 316,000 attended the rally. Police put the number at 103,000 at the peak.
Violence
Last weekend two initially peaceful protests degenerated into running skirmishes between baton-wielding riot police and activists, resulting in scores of injuries and more than 40 arrests.
Those fights followed larger outbreaks of violence in central Hong Kong last month, when police forced back activists with tear gas, rubber bullets and beanbag rounds.
Activists and human rights groups have called for an independent investigation into what they describe as excessive use of force by police.
The groups are also demanding the word “riot” be withdrawn from the government’s description of demonstrations and the unconditional release of those arrested.
What started as protests over the extradition bill have now morphed into demands for greater democracy, the resignation of leader Lam, and even curbing the number of mainland Chinese tourists to Hong Kong.
Under the terms of the handover from Britain in 1997, Hong Kong was allowed to retain extensive freedoms not enjoyed on the mainland, including an independent judiciary and right to protest.
But for many Hong Kong residents, the extradition bill is the latest step in a relentless march toward mainland control.
Future protests
Other anti-government protests are planned over coming weekends in areas including Mong Kok, a gritty working-class district across the harbor from the financial center, and in Tseung Kwan O and Sham Shui Po, one of the city’s poorest areas.
Opponents of the extradition bill fear it would leave Hong Kong people at the mercy of Chinese courts, where human rights are not guaranteed, and have voiced concerns about the city’s much-cherished rule of law.
Some material from the Associated Press is included in this article.
Iraqi Kurdish Officials Arrest Turkish Lawmaker’s Brother in Diplomat’s Slaying
IRBIL / SULAIMANIYA, IRAQ – Security services in Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region said Saturday that they had arrested the brother of a lawmaker serving in the Turkish parliament for the assassination of a Turkish diplomat in the Iraqi Kurdish regional capital, Irbil.
The diplomat was one of at least two people shot dead on Wednesday when a gunman opened fire in a restaurant where Turkish diplomats were dining.
“The Kurdistan region announced on Saturday the arrest of the man who planned the assassination of a Turkish diplomat in a restaurant in Irbil, less than a week after the attack,” the Asayish internal security service said in a statement.
It did not name the suspect but said “reports indicated” that his sister served as a Kurdish lawmaker in the Turkish parliament. A separate statement from another Iraqi Kurdish security force, the Counter Terrorism Department, gave the suspect’s name as Mazlum Dag.
Turkey’s pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) later confirmed that the man who arrested was the brother of one of its lawmakers, Dersim Dag.
It said it strongly condemned the attack on the diplomat and that “using the attack as a reason to make one of our lawmakers a target through the name of her brother is a provocation and unacceptable.”
An accomplice of Mazlum Dag’s has also been arrested, the security services said in a later statement.
Political violence is comparatively rare in Irbil, which has been spared the civil war and ethnic strife that hit the rest of Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion of 2003.
The shooter fled in a car driven by an accomplice, two Kurdish security officials and a witness said. The attack took place weeks after Turkey launched a new military offensive against Kurdish separatist militants based in northern Iraq.
Ankara’s main enemy in Iraq is the PKK group, which has based fighters in the mountainous border region, north of Irbil, during a decades-long insurgency in southeastern Turkey.
Turkey and the ruling Kurdish party in Irbil, the KDP, have blamed the PKK for other Turkey-related incidents in northern Iraq, including the storming of a Turkish military camp earlier this year.
Pence Lauds Apollo Astronauts on Anniversary of Moon Landing
On the 50th anniversary of humanity’s first moon landing, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence paid tribute to the three American astronauts who helped make the historic event a reality.
“They did more than win the space race, they brought together our nation, and for one brief moment, all the people of the world were truly one,” Pence said at an anniversary event Saturday at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
“Now, true to their creed, astronauts have never liked the idea of being called heroes. Yet for all they did, for all the risks they took, if Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Mike Collins are not heroes, then there are no heroes,” said Pence, chairman of the National Space Council, to enthusiastic applause.
On July 20, 1969, America’s lunar module named Eagle touched down at 2018 GMT, with Armstrong, the late astronaut, placing his left foot on the lunar surface six hours later.
The landing was an enormous diplomatic and technological Cold War-era achievement for the U.S., which was bested by the Soviet Union in putting the first human and satellite in space.
U.S. President Donald Trump said in a statement Saturday that the moon landing was a steppingstone to future space missions: “I have instructed the National Aeronautics Space Administration (NASA) to send the next man and first woman to the Moon and to take the next giant leap — sending Americans to Mars.”
The administration has launched plans to return to the moon by 2024 and land on Mars for the first time by 2033.
But debate about whether to return to the moon or go directly to Mars resurfaced Friday during a White House Oval Office gathering that included Apollo 11 astronauts Aldrin and Collins.
Collins, 88, who stayed in the command module while Aldrin and Armstrong descended to the moon, told Trump he supported going directly to Mars.